[silence] The Biennial Institute and Ostrava Days 2007 Festival are History

[S.E.M. Ensemble]

The Biennial Institute and Ostrava Days 2007 Festival are History

Ostrava Days 2007 Festival concluded on Saturday, September 1st with a major
performance featuring all four resident conductors: Petr Kotík, Ondřej
Vrabec, Roland Kluttig and Peter Rundel, who led the chamber orchestra
Ostravská banda and the Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra.

In the first half of the evening, Ostravská Banda performed Available Forms
I by the legendary New York School composer Earle Brown (conducted by
Kotik); Impression for alto saxophone and orchestra by OD resident-student
Paulina Zalubska (conducted by Vrabec); and Concert for Violin and Orchestra
by György Ligeti performed by Hana Kotková (conducted by Kluttig). After a
lengthy ovation, maestro Kluttig added an encore in honor of the festival
organizers that featured an excerpt from the Ligeti.
 
The second half of the program came as if from another world: Morton
Feldman's opera Neither, featuring New York soprano Martha Cluver, with the
Janáček Philharmonic conducted by Peter Rundel. Pamela Hunter from Media
Arts Production Zürich devised the multimedia staging. Samuel Beckett's
poetic libretto about "unspeakable  home - from impenetrable self to
impenetrable unself by way of neither", features only one character, a solo
soprano (Martha Cluver) who hovers over the sound of the orchestra in an
extremely high register.
 
Martha Cluver (born 1983) mastered the extremely difficult part with
elegance and lightness and delivered an astonishing performance. For almost
an hour of changing pitches between high G2 and Db3 (!), Ms. Cluver remained
perfectly in tune with the orchestra. Her amazing performance was
underscored by the fact that she began to study the part only four weeks ago
(replacing Pia Komsi who had to cancel her engagement due to illness).
Cluver brought the house to a tumultuous applause.
 
The Ostrava Days 2007 Festival (August 26 - September 1) has made the city
of Ostrava an important center for contemporary music. OD's Artistic
Director, composer, conductor, and flutist Petr Kotik curated the program of
15 concerts and featured music by major 20th and 21th century composers:
John Cage, Morton Feldman, Kaija Saariaho, Stefan Wolpe, Karlheinz
Stockhausen, Luigi Nono, Alvin Lucier, Iannis Xenakis, Christian Wolff,
Rudolf Komorous, Kurt Weil, Conlon Nanncarow, György Ligeti, Cornelius
Cardew, Galina Ustvolskaja, Petr Kotík, Phill Niblock, Helmut Lachenmann,
Bern Alois Zimmermann, Somei Satoh, Earle Brown, among others. This year,
Miroslav Srnka became the first Czech composer to be commissioned by Ostrava
Days. The festival program also included works by 27 of Ostrava Days
resident-students. In all, almost 100 compositions were performed. Some of
the most memorable performances were by New York's FLUX Quartet and the
Sonar Quartet from Berlin, Ostravska banda and soloists Charles Curtis
(violoncello), Hana Kotková and Conrad Harris (violin), Vilém Veverka
(oboe), Steven Fox (countertenor), Martha Cluver and Gayla Morgan
(sopranos), Thomas Buckner (baritone), Daan Vandewalle and Joseph Kubera
(piano) and Robin Hayward (tuba). The festival also featured a Fluxus
performance with Fluxus Artists Ben Patterson and Milan Knížák.
 
Ostrava Days has been organized every two years since 2001. They would not
be possible without the generous help from a number of foundations,
corporations and individuals including the newly founded association,
Friends of Ostrava Days as well as partnerships with the Janáček
Conservatory and Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra,  and media partners Czech
Radio Ostrava.
 
Our utmost thanks goes to the General Sponsor of Ostrava Days - OKD a.s. and
the City of Ostrava, as well as the Czech Republic's Ministry of Culture,
the International Visegrad Fund and the Czech-German Fond of Future.
 
We are looking forward to welcome you back in Ostrava again at the Ostrava
Days 2009!
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